Gene linked to height a health key

About a third of Ma¯ori and Pacific Islanders carry a gene variant that’s just been linked to taller height.

A national team of scientists yesterday revealed their latest insights into the gene CREBRF, which is found in no other ancestry groups.

Previous findings have linked the same gene with a higher body mass index (BMI) — a key measure of obesity — and, paradoxically, a lower risk of type 2 diabetes.

The new discovery, just published in the International Journal of Obesity, showed the variant was associated with an average height increase of 1.25cm for each copy of the gene a person had.

“One-point-two-five centimetres might not sound a lot, but this is the biggest effect on height of any gene variant identified to date anywhere in the world,” said lead author Associate Professor Rinki Murphy, of the University of Auckland and Maurice Wilkins Centre for Molecular Biodiscovery.

“It highlights how differences in our genes can have an impact on our body shape and structure.”

The study, initially funded by the Health Research Council, was part of a long-running collaboration between the University of Otago and East Coast primary health organisation Nga¯ti Porou Hauora.

Nga¯ ti Porou Hauora’s deputy chairman, Huti Puketapu-Watson, said the research was helping to “destigmatise” obesity and type 2 diabetes. “It empowers us, and helps to break the ‘one size fits all’ models underpinning health systems.”